The present invention relates to a tape feed mechanism including a tape storage cassette for housing at least two tapes whose width is nearly the same, the tapes being overlapped and cut, more particularly, to a tape feed mechanism capable of feeding the two tapes to a predetermined position in an overlapped state.
Apparatus for printing characters on a non-adhesive side of an adhesive tape has been well-known. In this type of apparatus, although characters such as names can be printed on tapes which can be suitably affixed to the desired objects, the printed characters are erased or become blurred because the printed surface is exposed. To solve this problem, an apparatus for making printed tapes where the printed surface is not exposed is disclosed in Japanese Patent Application No. SHO62-294471 and so forth. In the apparatus characters are reversely printed on a transparent film tape and a double-sided adhesive tape of the same width thereof is adhered thereon.
However, in the apparatus disclosed, because the film tape where characters are printed and the double-sided adhesive tape which is adhered thereon are separately mounted on the apparatus, it is not easy to attach and detach the tapes. To solve this problem, it is possible to provide a cassette which cooperatively houses the tapes to the printing apparatus. However, the tapes cannot be effectively attached to the printing apparatus by simply housing the tapes in the cassette. Since the tapes are arranged and coupled outside the cassette after characters are printed on the film tape, if both the tapes are housed in the cassette and the ends of the tapes are extended to the outside, whenever the cassette is attached to the printing apparatus, it is necessary to arrange the ends of the tapes and guide them to the connection portion, whereby the attaching operation becomes difficult.